Chapter 13.—The Hearer Must Be Moved as Well as Instructed.

29.  But for the sake of those who are so fastidious that they do not care for truth unless it is put in the form of a pleasing discourse, no small place has been assigned in eloquence to the art of pleasing.  And yet even this is not enough for those stubborn-minded men who both understand and are pleased with the teacher’s discourse, without deriving any profit from it.  For what does it profit a man that he both confesses the truth and praises the eloquence, if he does not yield his consent, when it is only for the sake of securing his consent that the speaker in urging the truth gives careful attention to what he says?  If the truths taught are such that to believe or to know them is enough, to give one’s assent implies nothing more than to confess that they are true.  When, however, the truth taught is one that must be carried into practice, and that is taught for the very purpose of being practiced, it is useless to be persuaded of the truth of what is said, it is useless to be pleased with the manner in which it is said, if it be not so learnt as to be practiced.  The eloquent divine, then, when he is urging a practical truth, must not only teach so as to give instruction, and please so as to keep up the attention, but he must also sway the mind so as to subdue the will.  For if a man be not moved by the force of truth, though it is demonstrated to his own confession, and clothed in beauty of style, nothing remains but to subdue him by the power of eloquence.

CAPUT XIII. Dicendo demum flectendi animi.

29. Propter eos autem quibus fastidientibus non 0102 placet veritas, si alio quocumque modo, nisi eo modo dicatur, ut placeat et sermo dicentis, datus est in eloquentia non parvus etiam delectationi locus. Quae tamen addita non sufficit duris, quos nec intellexisse, nec docentis elocutione delectatos esse profuerit. Quid enim haec duo conferunt homini, qui et confitetur verum, et collaudat eloquium, nec inclinat assensum, propter quem solum, cum aliquid suadetur, rebus quae dicuntur invigilat dicentis intentio? Si enim talia docentur quae credere vel nosse sufficiat, nihil est aliud eis consentire, nisi confiteri vera esse. Cum vero id docetur quod agendum est, et ideo docetur ut agatur, frustra persuadetur verum esse quod dicitur, frustra placet modus ipse quo dicitur, si non ita discitur ut agatur. Oportet igitur eloquentem ecclesiasticum, quando suadet aliquid quod agendum est, non solum docere ut instruat, et delectare ut teneat, verum etiam flectere ut vincat. Ipse quippe jam remanet ad consensionem flectendus eloquentiae granditate, in quo id non egit usque ad ejus confessionem demonstrata veritas, adjuncta etiam suavitate dictionis.